Filmmaker Menahem Golan dies in Israel at the age of 85
Menahem Golan, a veteran Israeli filmmaker who built an empire on the back of brawny men beating others senseless in a host of 1980s films, has died in Tel Aviv. He was 85.
Menahem Golan
1929-2014
Menahem Golan, a veteran Israeli filmmaker who built an empire on the back of brawny men beating others senseless in a host of 1980s films, has died in Tel Aviv. He was 85.
Golan produced more than 200 films and directed a quarter of them. But while others attended the Cannes film festival in tuxedoes, Golan wore rainbow-coloured braces over his T-shirts and proudly hawked a different type of fare.
It was the 1987 film Bloodsport that he produced that introduced American audiences to the face - and kicks - of a then-unknown Jean-Claude Van Damme. He produced Sylvester Stallone's take as a stone-faced cop in Cobra and later directed him as a truck-driving arm-wrestler in Over The Top. And he produced Charles Bronson's Death Wish - sequels two to five.
"Schlock is entertainment for the masses," he said in 1985. "It's fantasy. Storytelling without challenging the mind too much."
Golan, who died on Friday, is survived by his wife and three children.